Combining Touch, Mid-Air Gesture and Floor Mat Interaction on Public Displays

This study investigates a novel approach to simultaneously use the qualities of touch and mid-air gestures or floor mat interaction on a single public display. We envision how a single display may enable multiple users to retrieve information from the same display by interacting from different distances and via different affordances.

We demonstrate that although the concurrent use of multiple interaction modalities appeared functionally possible and has the potential to augment a single display with both personal and public functionalities, it is hampered by issues relating to display and interaction blindness, in addition to social discomfort and what we propose to name affordance blindness. We describe this blindness as the inability to understand the interaction modalities of a public display.